Research/ Assessment (91) Interdisciplinary (99) Numerous and varied teaching, learning, assessment, and institutional innovations in undergraduate STEM education have been developed in recent years - many funded by NSF - but little is known about the full extent of their impact. The goal of this proposal is to focus on the evidence of impact for a selected number of such innovations. To do this the National Research Council (NRC) is organizing two, one-day workshops which will be overseen by an independent steering committee appointed by the Chairman of the NRC. Each workshop is designed to illuminate the state of knowledge on the selected STEM innovations as well as suggest areas for additional research or where a major synthesis of existing research is needed. All of the conceptual work produced by this project will be coordinated with the work of another project at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) and provide information and guidance to that effort (DUE-0744106).
Intellectual Merit Throughout the last decade, STEM education innovations have been implemented in vastly different grain sizes, some being targeted at specific classrooms and others focused on reforming entire curricula. The need to look retrospectively at the ways in which innovations, along a continuum of scale, have influenced STEM education reform is significant. In addition there are missing links in our knowledge about the various ways in which STEM innovations have been replicated, either in part or in their entirety. The process of assembling a retrospective picture of STEM innovations and their influence must happen before the STEM fields can determine what is needed in the future. The opportunity for collaboration between WCER and the NRC on the question of evidence of impact of STEM innovations and future directions for STEM brings together two well-respected organizations to work on a knowledge problem of profound importance to the STEM community: What do we know, how do we know it, and how will that information serve the STEM field for the future?
Broader Impact Past investment in building innovations in the teaching, learning, faculty development, and assessment practices of STEM education have been pivotal in efforts to improve STEM teaching and learning. Many of these innovations were developed independently from one another and, therefore, have emphasized somewhat different goals. Consequently, communications across STEM disciplines and within STEM sub disciplines is often lacking. Work to develop a shared knowledge base of these innovations will help STEM education innovators think about future needs given the knowledge demands of this new century. This project is a critical next step in the work of achieving greater coherency on the knowledge-base of STEM reforms. Achieving broader understanding on evidence of impact on innovations is essential to moving forward to the next generation of reforms in STEM education. The linkage between the workshop activities in this project and the work of the WCER project increases the likelihood of achieving broader impacts.
